Recent reports only help raising more questions, and eyebrows, as a staggering 87% of Venezuelans are reportedly now under the poverty stats. When it comes to food, 6 out of 10 lost an average of 11 pounds of body mass in 2017, not for fitness purposes (don’t go getting any ideas, NHS, Corbyn) and 9 out of 10 are unable to afford daily food.
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Samizdata quote of the dayMarch 4th, 2018 |
 22 comments to Samizdata quote of the day |
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As always, socialism does an excellent job of sharing the poverty.
As always, democracy does an excellent job of sharing the poverty.
FTFY
Socialism exists when wealth is redistributed by force. Democracy is why wealth is redistributed by force.
It’s sad to watch the human capacity for rationalization in action. Here’s The Young Turks making excuses, saying it’s not socialism’s fault and hinting that it just has-ta have something like America’s CIA behind Venezuela’s failure, even though they admit that Venezuela failed to do A, B, C, D…
One of the best books you’ll ever read on how free markets (supply, demand and subsequent price equalibriums) self-regulate markets and how price fixing IS socialism and how socialism is doomed…is George Reisman’s The Government Against the Economy. Amazingly, you can get the kindle version from Amazon now for 99 cents. (I seem to remember that it was about 40 bucks when I bought it). And it has an 88% 5 star rating (all the rest are 4 stars).
I also have Reisman’s magnum opus, Capitalism, an absolutely enormous book, but that’s another story.
Granted that the scoundrels had a lot of votes and did get in initially afaik, but the last National Assembly returned a majority to get rid of the socialist scum, only for them to disqualify enough to stop the NA changing the constitution and then the NA was removed and by-passed by a fraudulent Constituent Assembly, so democracy is being destroyed.
Shlomo, which raises the question, if the majority are on-board with it, then why is force required? It’s not simply a dictatorship against the “haves”, it’s merely a dictatorship. One interesting thing to consider is the necessity for the nefarious governments to use propaganda, even against a disarmed public. Because, of course, if the entire nation became outraged, they would have a reenactment of Ceaușescu’s Romania on their hands.
Shlomo, and to beat you to the punch, yes America too has a nefarious government that uses “the media” to diseminate it’s propaganda and is now attacking alternative media like youtube. America’s “deep state” and justice dept are completely out of control.
Never bother, Corbin still loves ’em.
To the death so it seems.
What amazes me is the passivity of the masses. The only ones with any gumption would be those who have left. The majority are apparently willing to wait for any scraps that might get tossed their way. Soon Haiti will have a new rival for poorest country in the hemisphere and Venezuela’s regime (so far) is secure.
Matthew, Venezuela has brought in several thousand Cuban ‘security advisors’ to ensure that Maduro’s hold on power is not threatened. His own security forces have first priority over what food resources are available. Starving and hopeless people become passive. If real hope appears from somewhere, then there is a possibility of a broad revolution, but only then.
The average loss of body mass per victim is 11kg, not 11 lbs.
The idea that democracy has produced most of the regimes that have “distributed by force” is false S.M. Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot and so were not fans of democratic elections with the people being allowed to vote out governments they do not like.
As for Venezuela – as Mr Ed points out, even with all the bias and rigging against them, the opposition were able to win the National Assembly elections, the government just responded by more rigging – more subversion of democracy. Buy it we declare that the subversion of democracy does not matter, indeed that democracy is a bad thing – they that would not matter.
This is NOT to say that people are blameless – far from it. If people vote a demagogue into power he (or she – or a group) will rig the system so they can not be voted out. So people have a moral responsibility to NOT vote for such people – not even once. It was quite clear what sort of man the late Mr Chavez was – he had tried a military coup against an elected government. But he promised the people the Moon and Stars – and foolishly (and morally wrongly) they voted for him. He then OF COURSE tried to rig everything so that it would be harder-and-harder to vote him and his fellow socialists out of power. As John Adams warned centuries ago – only a moral and religious people (to him the terms were much the same thing – but then he was thinking in terms of the tolerant form of religion that was in fashion in his time) will keep elected government for long. A morally corrupt people will believe the wild promises of would-be dictators and soon loose their independence. The demagogue always brings in armed thugs – supposedly to guard against “the rich”, but really to be used against the very people who elected him (when, too late, they recognise their terrible mistake). Even Plato noted this – it is so ancient.
Of course when the chains are fitted to their necks and they feel the whip on their backs and see their children carried off to the slaughter house, the people cry out “but this is not what we wanted – we wanted someone to fight our battles for us, and so we supported this man” to which John Adams (and other sincere friends of elected government) would reply……
First Book of Samuel Chapter Eight – and it makes no difference if the ruler is called King, President or Prime Minister, what matters is that the people must NOT trust someone who makes wild promises and must NOT allow power to be concentrated in the hands of a ruling group. The people must fight their own battles – and have the independence so-to-do.
And independence is not just a matter of firearms – it is also a matter of moral self restraint (self control). The austere Republican virtue of Cato the Younger, or George Buchanan in 16th century Scotland.
Otherwise tyrants such as Philip II of Spain, or Louis XIV of France arise – and the fact that the new tyrants are called Presidents rather than Kings (and hold SHAM elections) makes no difference.
This is like asking “if the majority of Germans wanted to put Jews in ovens & gas chambers then why was force required? The answer, of course, is that when not everyone consents to a policy force is often required to make sure that policy happens anyway. Whether that policy is putting Jews in ovens or regulating small companies out of business, taxing and redistributing wealth on a massive scale.
Huh? I don’t understand how this contradicts anything I have said.
Indeed, and there’s a reason why in democracies politicians’ strategists, speech writers, campaign personnel and communications staff emulate the rallies, soaring oratory, flags, visuals, approach, marches, and demonstrations used by fascists such as the Nazis. Propaganda is extremely important to the rulers of fascist and democratic regimes because where political power is inherently insecure and unstable (which it is in fascist governments and democratic societies), propaganda is required to rally passion, galvanize support, “get out the vote”, change hearts & minds, and make everyone hate the other political party etc.
Um, yeah. this does not contradict what I said above in this thread.
The trend line in democracy is clear. Yes, there are peaceful rebellions where the right rises and unseats a bunch of left wing politicians. But these surges against the overwhelming tide are temporary delays on the sweep of history which knows but one direction in democracy: leftwards.
The small government movement in America has been unmitigated failure for GENERATIONS. Hardings return to normalcy, Nixon, Reagan Revolution, Contract with America 1994, and Tea Party have achieved NOTHING of lasting consequence. The debt keeps going up, up, up, the regulations keep getting longer, worse, more complicated and less predictable, and printing out of thin air keeps buying more time. Yes sometimes there are temporary changes like right now regulations aren’t getting worse for certain industries thanks to Trump but this is temporary and will be more than corrected for in 4/8 years once Democrats are in charge again, and the trend line will continue. I mean FFS Trump and the GOP couldn’t even repeal Obamacare. Tea Party couldn’t balance the damn budget for even just ONE YEAR. It’s pathetic.
So people who were not elected have done bad things.
Therefore, it follows, that democracy is not a bad form of government.
Good logic.
Anyway I never said that democracy has produced most of the regime that have “distributed by force”
Democracies have hardly ever been around in human history. Most of human history humans were ruled by wonderful hereditary monarchs as it should be.
Even America didn’t become a “true” democracy… or a “constitutional republic” (excuse me, I just puked in my mouth) where women could vote until less than 100 years ago.
So obviously democracies haven’t done that much terrible stuff, since they’ve only been around for like 2 mins and a couple mins at a couple moments long time ago. But on a per-year basis no form of government has done nearly as much harm as democracy has in the cumulative 4 minutes it has been around on earth. Democracy is terrible.
Saying democracy has not done that much terrible stuff reminds me of when fashionable progressive comedians like Bill Maher and Doug Stanhope say that religious people are responsible for most of the genocide and slaughter and mayhem in history. And it’s true, we religious people are responsible for most of it. But we religious people comprise way way way more than “most” of the humans who have existed in history. See, this is the bit that Maher, Stanhope etc miss. The vast vast majority of humans who have lived in history were not so insane as to think that they could live life without a religion.
On a per capita basis religious people have not done NEARLY as much horrific stuff as the non-religious, I mean “non-religious” enlightened allegedly secular people who don’t have any religion except when they discover emotional attachment to religious beliefs that have no basis in reality when you shit all over their bullshit sacred cows be they Aryan racial supremacy or mandatory transgender pronouns.
Good. Let those who vote for tyranny and socialism get exactly what they wanted.
Wait, are you actually defending democracy on the basis that people have a MORAL RESPONSIBILITY to not vote for demagogues and that they won’t or at least shouldn’t violate that moral responsibility?
Wait, really?
Are you, like, trying to make my argument for me?
Have you followed the news.. ever? Or read a history book? Is history replete with examples of the people (like when men and women could vote) seeing massive public debt, taxes, and regulations and responding by electing their era’s Rand Pauls, balancing budgets, and slashing taxes and regulations and turning the country prosperous again? Or is history full of the same dumbasses who elected Barack Obama as POTUS, saw what a great job he did with healthcare, and so RE-ELECTED him?
The American people elected FDR. They saw what a great job he did with making the American regulatory state massive and complex and impossible to understand, and expanded government and created the welfare state. So what did they do? The American people re-elected him again and again. The American people voted to elect and then RE-ELECT Barack Obama as POTUS. And judging by how students treat conservatives on college campuses (physical violence in response to verbal “microaggresions” and rioting to prevent conservatives from giving speeches on campus) I don’t think that Americans “exercising moral responsibility” is something that an intelligent man would bet on.
So your plan is to give dumb drunk people the car keys and hope they don’t drive the car.
I have a different idea.
Take the car keys away.
Ideally I’d embed this but I don’t think the Samazdata comments interface lets me do that so you’ll just have to clock on the link
http://di2.nu/pix/caracasresortspa2.png
“Starving and hopeless people become passive. ” George Atkisson (March 4, 2018 at 9:44 pm)
This is sadly very true.
– Stalin found it so in the years when, as Conquest put it, he made the Ukraine one vast Belsen. As in Belsen, well-fed, well-armed squads of police and activists supervised the starving inmates. As one farmer put it, described why he had done nothing when the kulaks were rounded up, “We thought, fools that we were, there could be nothing worse than that.”
– All the statistics show that the later Jews waited before they stopped obeying orders of the nazi state, the less chance they had of escaping. In some case, 50% of those who fled and hid died – but 99%+ of those who went to the camps died.
Any criminal knows this who waves a gun at you and says, “Get in the alley” or “Get in the car”. The immediate threat of death is meant to distract you from the much greater certainty of it if you do not take your chance and run immediately. It is the same with criminal states. I hope Venezuela has not passed the point at which only outside help can rid them of their Cuban-enforced socialist paradise.
In defense of democracy, remember that Venezuela’s woes started once Chavez eliminated the term limits, regardless of whether this was a change voted for, it was a blatant abuse and perversion of what was a seemingly democratic constitution to even suggest it in the first place.
Democracy happens due to liberty, and once socialism starts “forcing” it starts becoming a sham of it’s original intention when the liberty is lost.
Venezuela’s woes became more woeful after Chavez eliminated the term limits. They did not start then. Chavez policies always sold Venezuela’s future for his present.
Putin shuttled between prime minister and president, employing subordinates in the other office.
In the Weimar years, Hitler never even attempted to become a member of the Reichstag, but when Goering presided over the Reichstag, it was known whom he served.
Hence the happier anglosphere experience with separation of powers, meaning some institution will have some interest in, and some ability to defend, a given constitutional law.