Venezuelan Socialism in Action: Starvation for the People, Desk Empanadas for the Powerful

President Maduro pulls a tasty snack out of his desk during a live broadcast

During a live televised address in Venezuela—which is the midst of a brutal food shortages brought about by a brutal socialst regime—President Nicolas Maduro pulled this stealthy snack move:

Venezuela's president, already mocked for gaining weight amid a hunger crisis, pulls out an empanada from his desk during a live TV address. pic.twitter.com/sPw63dbt83

— Hannah Dreier (@hannahdreier) November 3, 2017

The video was captured and tweeted by ProPublica's Hannah Dreier, a former A.P. correspondent in Venezuela. She notes that Maduro was "already mocked for gaining weight against a hunger crisis." Generally I'm against fat shaming, but I'm willing to grant a one-time exception.

Reason has been covering the situation in Venezuela, which continues to worsen. Good soldiers are rewarded with scarce basic necessities such as toilet paper. Citizens are urged to eat rabbits. Opposing forces have taken to the streets as the country's socialism descends into dictatorship. Meanwhile the government is reserving food aid for loyalists and others turn to bitcoin to survive.

Also this, from Remy:

Comments

[Citizen X - #6]

as the country's socialism descends into dictatorship.

Descends? That's a tiny lateral move at best.

[Citizen X - #6]

Also, Desk Empanada is Crusty's nickname at the office.

[John]

Crusty on the oustide, chewy on the inside.

[BestUsedCarSales]

And filled with pineapple.

[loveconstitution1789]

That is NOT pineapple. Beware!

[Entelechy]

Desk, we have no empanadas,
We have no empanadas today !

[TrickyVic (old school)]

The funny thing is socialism does not dissolve classes when implemented, it becomes peasants and the ruling class. For some reason SJWs don't get that.

[Citizen X - #6]

That's what's so great - the socialism label thereby becomes plausibly deniable when it inevitably fails.

[NotAnotherSkippy]

If only uncle joe knew what was going on.

[ChipToBeSquare]

Marx's strange relationship with feudalism makes a lot of sense in hindsight. He truly did find a lot to like in it, which is why it's hysterical when capitalism is compared to feudalism

[John]

Read Thomas Mann's The Magic Mountain sometime. The Marxist character in the book Leo Naphta also has a love for the Inquisition and the the Medival Church.

[Square = Circle]

Marx's strange relationship with feudalism makes a lot of sense in hindsight.

^ This.

There's real nostalgia in Marx for feudal times, although in his mind he seems to separate the culture of feudalism from the power structures of feudalism.

Contrary to popular belief, Marx actually had a lot of good things to say about Capitalism and free markets - he just tended to compare them unfavorably with an ideal in his mind that somehow combined notions of honor, duty, and community from feudalism without carrying forward the power structures, and where free markets could somehow exist apart from Capitalism and the perceived negatives that Capitalism brought in the form of individualism and valuing profit over "honor and duty."

[Square = Circle]

And yes - it's hilarious, and a little dismaying, that ignorant people like Tony see free market Capitalism as being somehow akin to feudalism, when anyone who's even glancingly familiar with history knows that it is Capitalism (not even the free-market variety) that destroyed feudalism.

Socialism, in fact, as Marx himself points out in the Manifesto was cooked up by aristocrats precisely to preserve the feudal order against the emerging Capitalist class.

[mashed potatoes]

I wonder if he fears finding himself on the end of a lamppost at all.. he really doesn't appear to

[DJF]

He's too heavy to hang from a lamppost, he would bend it.

[Hugh Akston]

Generally I'm against fat shaming, but I'm willing to grant a one-time exception.

Where did you come down on the Fruit Sushi incident?

[Citizen X - #6]

That particular waiter has been... dealt with.

By "dealt with" i mean given an 8% tip and a mediocre review on Yelp.

[Square = Circle]

a mediocre review on Yelp.

Have some mercy, man.

smdh

[DJF]

South American leaders were a lot more impressive when they wore fancy uniforms with lots of medals.

Boring socialist clothes don't cut it.

[cgr2727]

That's one thing the Norks actually get right. Some of those generals look like they're going to have to get a longer coat if they get another row of medals. It's interesting to read about all the found archives and what-not in places like East Germany. Makes me wonder what it will be like at some point in the future when they start seriously researching and writing about the future northern provinces of the ROK (formerly known as Best Korea). There was nothing remotely funny about the Stasi, Uncle Joe, Ceaucescu, and the rest, but the Norks just seem more and more like some bizarre comedic parody of a dictatorship (one with nukes of course).

[Square = Circle]

They do know how to dress their soldiers, but I tend to find myself wondering "what are all those medals for?" Are they pretending that they've engaged in some sort of significant military activity recently?

[Rat on a train]

What are most US medals for? I left the Army with 10 medals (not counting multiple awards). Only 3 were for merit (+1 second award). The others were for going where I was ordered. I would have 5 more but missed Desert Storm by luck and Bosnia by injury.

[cgr2727]

I'm guessing a lot of the Nork medals are for 1) clapping ferociously at rallies, 2) swooning in the presence of Dear Leader, and 3) heroic note-scribbling as Dear Leader comments during his tour of No. 17 Juche Shirt Button Factory.

You're right about the US medals too. My grandmother just sent me all of my grandpa's stuff from the big war. Aside from the silver star he got as a medic on Iwo Jima, most of them are the equivalent of participation ribbons. One for being enlisted before 1941, another one to celebrate the victory, another one for being in the Pacific (I assume others got one for being in Europe).

[Rich]

Citizens are urged to eat rabbits

Venezuelan bumper sticker: "Come m?s zarig?eya"

[Square = Circle]

Y ladrar menos.

[I can't even]

Excuse me while I whip this out.

[CharlesWT]

Imperfect capitalism: Health and wealth.
Imperfect socialism: Death and destruction.

[NotAnotherSkippy]

You forgot perfect socialism. Nevermind, you didn't.

[ChipToBeSquare]

"They're starving because 40% of Venezuela's businesses haven't been collectivized yet"

The number may not be accurate (it's somewhere near half) but this is a thing they do say

[Rich]

Yello - La Habanera

Desk Empanada
He is ready for a fight

[John C. Randolph]

He's just showing his solidarity with his friend and ally, Kim Fat Ass, the baby god dictator of the Norks.

-jcr

[John]

From the looks of it Maduro is so worried about the fate of Venezuala's citizens that he has been stress eating for weeks.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

The video was captured and tweeted by ProPublica's Hannah Dreier, a former A.P. correspondent in Venezuela. She notes that Maduro was "already mocked for gaining weight against a hunger crisis." Generally I'm against fat shaming, but I'm willing to grant a one-time exception.

KMW, if you mock the leaders of a Socialist country, you kind of are, by definition, fat-shaming.

[Libertarian]

Luckily he didn't use a knife and fork, or American Marxists would have finally found a reason to turn on him.

[Citizen X - #6]

He just went to town on that thing. My dog has more dignity when i give him a piece of cheese.

[Maven Houlihan]

He reminds me of Rafi and the pocket dogs.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2figKn2aBFU

[Enjoy Every Sandwich]

But...but...Scandinavia!!!

[John B. Egan]

I read a variety of blogs.. This one included, and I have voted Libertarian in the past. (I was very impressed with Brown for example.). But, I'd like to see a more even-handed and honest appraisal of various countries' situations.

Venezuela is always beaten up and used as an example of what happens to socialist states. In fact, most socialist states are better off than we are.. Germany, Switzerland, France.. China.. And the reason that Venezuela failed has little to do with socialism, and everything to do with their upper-crust picking the pockets of the country, borrowing absurd amounts of money from the IMF, who imposed outlandish requirements on Venezuela, causing it to collapse.

The Hugo Chavez socialism, like the Castro experiment, was a response to those activities, not a cause of them.

In the meanwhile, as we beat up a poor South American nation, what are we doing about the present GOP/Trump tax plan, which is doing something similar, just not to the same extreme, but cutting social services, dedcutions for the average American, while preserving and in the case of the estate tax, ehnacing them for the wealthy, cutting the corporate tax rate to 20% when after deductions, it is already an average 17%?

It should make you womder.

[ChipToBeSquare]

There's no wondering at all. Look up the corporate tax rate and regulatory burden in some of these successful countries* and tell me if they still meet any definition of the word socialist. They're generally market economies with massive redistribution, and many are trending towards cutting programs because they've grown expensive and increased unemployment

*China is doing better than us? Certainly they're powerful as a whole but you'd rather be an average citizen here than an average citizen over there. Plus what is it that brought them out of starvation? Becoming more socialist, or becoming slightly more capitalist?

[Sevo]

"...In fact, most socialist states are better off than we are.. Germany, Switzerland, France.. China.."

Uh, lets be honest here:
BULL
.
.
.
.
SHIT.

[Spookk]

Dont confuse the close-minded with facts.

You also stepped in it by not qualifying what you meant about "China", although most informed people would know that standard of living, social mobility, modernization (factory and personal), expansion of industrial capacity, etc is significantly "better" in China for these past many years now than it has been in the US.

Your main point, that an oligarchy/kleptocracy is bad, also applies with full force in the US, and is why we make crap products now (even our candy is crappy thanks to palm oil, etc), while corps are allowed to run amok with our political processes while offshoring all the wealth they can and abandoning any pretense of the social contract that allowed them to exist in the first place.

[IceTrey]

The banality of evil.

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[hive of scum]

Anyone else notice a similarity between Maduro and Stalin? The hair and the mustache....Stalin looked well fed too.

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[Spookk]

Mislabeling fascism as socialism doesn't help the "reporting" value of this article.

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