[ELUNIVERSAL] Not too far in the future Venezuelans will look back on these days with nostalgia. If Venezuela was an airplane, impending crash signals would be lighting up like a Christmas tree in the cockpit, while back in the cabin, passengers might be ordering a second cocktail to blank out the worrisome bumps they feel. But when the plane crashes, it takes everyone aboard on a trip to hell that they didn't know they paid for. Here's a look at the cockpit signals:
Oil production has been falling while the much-touted natural gas resources are not being produced at all. Agricultural and manufacturing production is virtually gone. The wealth creation capacity of the nation has been disemboweled. This has caused massive importation of goods with no dollars to pay for them, driving the currency to 42/$ in Cucuta and emptying miles of store shelves, protected from view only by electricity blackouts. Printing more devalued currency has driven the implied annual inflation rate to 249.3% according to the economist Steve Hanke, not the 35.2% officials propagate, which is still the highest in the Americas.
As if the slide toward hyperinflation were not enough, Venezuela's streets are plagued by one of the highest murder, kidnapping, and extortion rates in the world, which are under-reported and rarely investigated, no less prosecuted. Corruption romps merrily through fields of cocaine, government procurement contracts, and money laundering. A 660% profit can be made by selling dollars in Cucuta. The newly super-rich and well-connected Boligarchs pop up in the same places where children go hungry and the poor get poorer. This is a revolution, all right, but not the one that was advertised.
There is no internal solution: the insiders have all the power and money, which they're holding onto tightly. And there is no external solution: international institutions -including the court for Human Rights- have all been expelled or replaced by the regime in charge. As Venezuela approaches the chaos of Syria, these terrible days may be remembered fondly as the last cocktail before the air crash. Last one out -don't worry about turning off the lights. They're already out.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/02/2013 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11125 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
So toilet paper is more valuable then their currency?
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/02/2013 9:26 Comments ||
Top||
#7
Printing more devalued currency has driven the implied annual inflation rate to 249.3% according to the economist Steve Hanke, not the 35.2% officials propagate, which is still the highest in the Americas.
Silly rabbits. They should be goosing the money supply via electronics, not printing presses. Doesn't seem to be a problem in the Good Ol' USofA.... /sarc
It's worth considering the risks and rewards in the budget standoff, which is first and foremost a battle for control of the Republican Party and the shape of the 2014 and 2016 primaries. The Republican Party of John McCain and Mitt Romney lost two presidential elections, the second to a weak candidate in a weak economy. Left to its own devices, it will lose the next presidential election and all the following ones.
By picking a fight on Obama's least popular position, namely health care, the conservative wing of the party galvanized the party base and forced the House leadership into a fight. In a June 27 poll, the Gallup organization found that just 22% of Americans expected Obamacare to improve their family's health situation, while 47% expected it to make it worse. As my old partner Jude Wanniski used to say, the electorate is like a diamond, waiting to be cut at exactly the right spot. Ted Cruz pointed the chisel correctly.
Opposing a bad program, to be sure, is not the same as building a national majority around a good program. The Republican Party is a long way from that. Just as the conservative wing of the party needed its chance after the Nixon and Ford debacles of the 1970s, the conservative wing of the party needs to take its shot after the abysmal performance of the McCain wing--or there will be no party at all.
It well may be true that shutting down the government hurts the Republicans in the short run. That is immaterial; there is no way to get from here to there except by making a stand against Obamacare. There is no downside, for the Republican Party as presently configured already is a guaranteed loser. A reinvigorated conservative leadership has a chance of leading the party to victory. And then what?
#1
"A reinvigorated conservative leadership has a chance of leading the party to victory".
This will be Democrat and Republican and Independent conservatives. The real tea party.
The left and media want to squash them but they can't. They are so outnumbered. They only need a voice to focus their energy and drive. The tropical depression is developing. Perhaps a hurricane. We will have to keep watch. This could be a cat 5. :) Another Regan event with no Tip O'Neil to bugger things up.
#2
The "Constitutional Crisis" began in January of 2008. What we are seeing today are simply more nails in the coffin of liberty. It was reported that mounted police will be patrolling the WWII memorial today. Symbols of American greatness and heraldry were the Champ's first targets. Sending back to England, the Oval Office bust of Churchill on his first day in office, an early indicator of things to come.
#3
It was reported that mounted police will be patrolling the WWII memorial today.
Amazing how an open monument that didn't require any attention 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year suddenly needs mounted police. Can you say 'police state' boys and girls?
#4
If I weren't working, I would go up to DC just to defy them.
It should be interesting if the government starts arresting these veterans. The news pictures would be interesting "There is James Jones, age 88, who was an 18 year old infantryman at the Battle of the Bulge, being arrested for visiting the WW II memorial".
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
10/02/2013 11:20 Comments ||
Top||
#5
What do you suppose would be the effect of a taser on a horse?
#10
What do you suppose would be the effect of a taser on a horse?
At best, a thrown rider. At worst, a hoof through your skull. Rather risky. Cattle prods pack more oomph and its best to get them just behind the front legs.
Don't ask how I know this.
Posted by: S.A.M. New Delhi Field Office ||
10/02/2013 14:51 Comments ||
Top||
#11
At the end of the article: That isnt enough: they have to present a credible program to restore economic growth and opportunity.
Good luck with that. Even with restored opportunities, economic growth may be minimal.
#2
Hmmm, link won't work, wonder if Obama's trying to keep the truth quiet?
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/02/2013 0:45 Comments ||
Top||
#3
If I was an international businessman, I'd build a medical complex in Juárez. Staff it with hindu doctors. It's bound to be better than what'll be available at home to americans who're not members of nomenclatura.
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/02/2013 7:55 Comments ||
Top||
#6
#3 yes that is an idea but far easier to have an approved physician or several with different specialties affiliated with a hospital group. Private practice $15000/month insurance now. Sheltered under group plan who knows what that cost would drop down to. Then have PA's say four. Then say 6-8 nurses. Then the kicker 12 government approved navigators to screen and deal with initial intake(subsidized). Take the Obama insured. Take abortions the Medicaid and Medicare. High volume. Money made on testing. Money made on volume. In and out the door. No need to see Doctor. Obama patient only cares about price. Life has lost all its value. Then death by population decline. So goes economy. So goes civilization. The progressive way of anti human life.
#7
And the chaos will continue, America workers will become poorer as their hours are cut, and they are forced into purchasing their own health care insurance. Access to health care facilities will be curtailed as only "approved" health care providers are "sanctioned" by the federal government. Your health records become an "open book" to anyone "remotely connected" to the healthcare business.
CHAOS will reign.
Posted by: Au Auric ||
10/02/2013 14:18 Comments ||
Top||
#8
I'm planning on going to the doctor in a couple of days for my annual visit, and I'm undecided as to whether to pay him myself (as I've been doing for years), or give them my Medicare card that I was forced to take in order to get my Social Security (they stole it from me I paid into it for decades, and I want some of back out!).
I'm not interested in being asked about my s3x life, etc. Decisions, decisions ....
Posted by: Barbara ||
10/02/2013 16:12 Comments ||
Top||
#9
We had to pass the bill so you could find out what was in it!
#10
the most interesting thing to me is that the donks haven't identified any that's right not one company that has significantly increased payroll due to obamacare
some of the temp firms have increase hiring but the donks don't care to frame those
Posted by: lord garth ||
10/02/2013 19:20 Comments ||
Top||
#11
#3 Juarez is a bit of a free fire zone at the moment, as are a number of other traditional border crossings, though chartered flights further in are probably within cost effectiveness. People are already crossing the border to get pharmaceuticals at a reduced rate and medical tourism is on the increase.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[ELUNIVERSAL] Not too far in the future Venezuelans will look back on these days with nostalgia. If Venezuela was an airplane, impending crash signals would be lighting up like a Christmas tree in the cockpit, while back in the cabin, passengers might be ordering a second cocktail to blank out the worrisome bumps they feel. But when the plane crashes, it takes everyone aboard on a trip to hell that they didn't know they paid for. Here's a look at the cockpit signals:
